Friday, October 26, 2018

America! America!


Over Here, Over There: a USA leadership Pattern of Divide, Destroy, Disbelieve, Disconnect

A
 country whose leaders have for decades committed unspeakable atrocities, have driven millions of people against one another, destroyed institutions of culture, society, education, and government, leaving fear and endless animosity and waves upon waves of chaos and conflict —and lacking the humility and courage sufficient to earnestly apologize and set about mending their ways and mending the damage they’ve done —
…these leaders, having neglected their country’s vital needs and now facing full-on breakdown … double down; and
… bring characteristically criminal, immoral, misguided, barbaric foreign policy, practices of divisiveness and violent aggression, to domestic policies and practices of the homeland.
This latest “street infraction” and distraction involving illegal use of U.S. mail delivery services is but another excuse to bring government leaders and their partners’ barbarism and backlash home.


A

merica, America!
Where are your leaders who love their “country more than self,” “mercy more than life?”
Where, America, America, is your “good” crowned “with brotherhood?”




Sources

“Over the past week, what appeared to be small pipe bombs were reportedly sent to (a media organization and a few individuals)… None of the devices detonated.”

RT “FBI detains mail bomb suspect, seizes white van with pro-Trump posters”
“Two law enforcement sources have named the man as 56-year-old Cesar Sayoc. Sayoc was arrested in Plantation, Florida, and according to CNN, has a criminal history.… Sources say DNA evidence played a role in Sayoc’s arrest.” October 26, 2018 https://www.rt.com/usa/442371-mail-bomb-suspect-detained-/
RT “‘Bring them to swift justice, we can’t allow political violence in America’—(U.S. President Donald) Trump on mail bomber” 
“Identified by media as Cesar Sayoc of Aventura, Florida, the suspect was arrested on Friday. His age was given as either 54 or 56. Photos of a white van allegedly belonging to Sayoc show it covered with stickers supporting Trump and denigrating Democrats and the media.”
 October 26, 2018 https://www.rt.com/usa/442383-trump-mail-bomber-political-violence/

“
America the Beautiful” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/America_the_Beautiful

Lyrics were written by American writer, poet, professor, and social activist Katharine Lee Bates (August 12, 1859 – March 28, 1929) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katharine_Lee_Bates

Music composed by American organist and composer Samuel Augustus Ward (December 28, 1847 – September 28, 1903) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_A._Ward

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Tuesday, October 23, 2018

Look to U.S. decades-long policies driving Central American Migration


Conditions causing Impoverishment, Pain, Debt, Displacement

U.S. Atrocities, Fallout, Responsibility

Despite cries and lies of a Central American “invasion”— this is not an invasion from Central America but arguably an migration because of U.S. invasion of Central of American countries.

There are ALWAYS preexisting conditions, prior happenings, driving forces, underlying causes inherent in current events. But U.S. mass media and mendacious government officials would rather deny and dissemble than own up to and take responsibility for the wrongs of this America, the United States of America.There seems an absence of courage and humility necessary to amend the ways and character of U.S. policy and to right the wrongs of the past and present.

Some Causes Underlying Migration

Cole Kazdin reporting


I

t is impossible to view domestic immigration and immigration policy “without examining the U.S. foreign policy roots of the current crisis.”

“Why don’t Central Americans just stay in their own countries?”

Because, for decades, the United States of America (its leadership) has “put itself on the wrong side of” Central Americans’ “struggles.” The U.S. has stymied the progress of Central Americans through a variety of tactics of interference including invasion, corruption, regime change, displacement, offensive occupation—all the while blaming and demeaning Central Americans for failing to make unhampered progress; for not staying in their countries and bettering their lives.

Some of the U.S. policy causes

U.S. CIA 1954: “helped organize a military coup to overthrow Guatemala’s democratically elected government, and continued to train the Guatemalan military well into the 1970s.” Some “200,000” Guatemalans died, hundreds of thousands were displaced” in a “36-year-long civil war (1960-1996),” a reign of terror was intent on “destroying people’s vision of the future.”

Richard Nixon-era (1971 - ): a drug war that “pushed cartels from Colombia into an increasingly unstable and impoverished Central America.” “Government-linked organized crime networks” rose “out of the counterinsurgency experience of the 1980s.” Hundreds of thousands fled “violence, massacres and political persecution that the United States was funding directly or, at the very minimum, covering up and excusing” (Professor Elizabeth Oglesby)

Cold War Reagan era: “Under the umbrella of the Cold War,” the United States “amplified its presence in (Central America)…, especially El Salvador.…” Ever since the Cold War, the United States has been “complicit in creating rampant and bloody gang violence, dire poverty, displacement and migration from El Salvador.”


T

he United States has been “complicit in the creation of the conditions of forced migration” and given these historical acts and conditions, Xochitl Sanchez told Kazdin, the United States of America “has a moral and social responsibility to this (Central American) population of immigrants.”

IMF, World Bank, Debt, Fallout, Responsibility
Author of Optimizing America, Jarl Jensen writes:

“The United States’ habit of interfering in the affairs of other countries remains a known fact around the world. The rich history of the U.S. military and economic intervention in Central America weakened the region, causing them to become dependent on the United States.”


T

he constant interference of the United States combined with the formation of the Bretton Woods Agreement, the IMF, the World Bank and CAFTA-DR negatively influenced the economy of Central America. Worsening the region’s economic condition was the ongoing interference from their neighbor and the formation of the 2004 Dominican Republic — Central America FTA (CAFTA-DR). All of this gave rise to drug cartels, violence, corruption, and a failing economy.
The Bretton Woods Agreement is the system for monetary and exchange rate management established on July 1, 1944, at the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire. The agreement pegged currencies to the price of gold and perceived the U.S. dollar as a reserve currency connected to the price of gold.
From the agreement, emerged the IMF and the World Bank — two global institutions — thus fulfilling the aim of the meeting to ensure a foreign exchange system, promote economic development, and prevent competitive devaluations.
…When a country’s currency fell, other countries agreed to purchase their money in foreign markets at fixed exchange rates between the US dollar and their currency, thus preventing inflation and economic instability.
Third-world countries were unaware that “this agreement paved the way for the United States to assume dominance over other nations, who were asking for loans from the IMF and funds from the World Bank to rebuild their country.”
T

hese conditions “led to an increase in illegal immigrants from Central America flooding the United States.” Now there are consequences all round but the United States is responsible for illegal immigrants from Central America crossing the border.
“And instead of instating the ‘Zero-tolerance Policy’ on unauthorized entry into the United States and detaining and separating parents and children from each other,” the United States “needs to reflect on its history, the root cause of refugee migration from Central America.…
Rewind the clock to see how (the United States of America) can make these wrongs right.” Then “take steps to resolve the issue of illegal immigrants from Central America coming to the United States to start their new life.
T

he world would be better, safer and more humane if globalization meant that all economies thrived and (were) not subjugated by debt.”



Sources

VICE “The Violence Central American Migrants Are Fleeing Was Stoked by the US:
We’re still dealing with the aftermath of atrocities committed by US allies in Central America during the Cold War.” Cole Kazdin June 28, 2018 https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/qvnyzq/central-america-atrocities-caused-immigration-crisis

Cole Kazdin is a Los Angeles based writer.

Xochitl Sanchez is part of the Central American Resource Center (CARECEN)

Dr. Elizabeth Oglesby is Associate Professor Latin American Studies faculty (University of Arizona)  with an interdisciplinary background in Latin American Studies, Geography, and Sociology and previous experience working for non-governmental organizations in Central America. Her research interests include globalization and labor issues, human rights, and Central America, especially Guatemala https://las.arizona.edu/user/elizabeth-oglesby

Medium “The Real Cause of Illegal Immigrants from Central America” Jarl Jensen August 6, 2018 https://medium.com/@jarljensensocial_76795/the-real-cause-of-illegal-immigrants-from-central-america-779954115311
Jarl Jensen is author of Optimizing America.

Wikipedia

The Central American Resource Center (CARECEN) was first founded in Washington DC (1981) as a community-based organization seeking “to foster the comprehensive development of the Latino community” in the Washington metropolitan region; two years later it was established in Los Angeles, California. “CARECEN provides direct services in immigration, housing and citizenship while also promoting empowerment, civil rights advocacy and civic training for Latinos.”  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_America_Resource_Center
Jarl Jensen August 6, 2018 https://medium.com/@jarljensensocial_76795/the-real-cause-of-illegal-immigrants-from-central-america-779954115311

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Sunday, October 21, 2018

Long and Winding Road to Annihilation


Era of Ronald Wilson Reagan & Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev replaced by  
Era of Donald John Trump/John Robert Bolton & a no doubt perplexed Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin

We live in a serious world with serious problems, where deep fissures need fixing, gulfs need bridging, minds need healing, and relations need mending. Yet the world must suffer further — holding its breath while a lunatic runs amok for two more years and three months before returning to a playground and playmates whose capitalist perversity luxuriates in carelessness, cast-off charity, and waste applauded by them as traits of “good” character.

T
he latest stunt declares war against a fragile peace. Attempts, as one former leader said, to “undermine all the efforts” made more than thirty years ago by leaders of (even more so today) nuclear-majority powers, the USSR and USA. This latest White House stunt expands even more recklessly the enacted policies of 
  • violent aggression
  • sanctions
  • spread of lethal arms
  • abandoned landmines
  • verbal threats and blackmail against nations and peoples —
  • All further jeopardizing the health and human rights, safety and security of peoples, and the planet at large. 
Thirty-two years ago came Reykjavík then the INF

U
.S. President Ronald Wilson Reagan and USSR General Secretary Mikhail Sergeyevich  Gorbachev on December 8, 1987, signed the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (or INF Treaty) in Washington, D.C.

The previous year had come the Reagan-Gorbachev Reykjavík (Iceland) Summit (October 11-12, 1986) where some progress was made in addressing the nuclear arms problem.

The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), formerly titled “Treaty Between the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics on the Elimination of Their Intermediate-Range and Shorter-Range Missiles,” was ratified by the U.S. Senate on May 27, 1988, and came into effect on June 1, 1988.

The INF is an arms control agreement (between USA and USSR later the Russian Federation) that eliminates “all nuclear and conventional missiles, as well as their launchers, with ranges of 500–1,000 kilometers (310–620 mi) (short-range) and 1,000–5,500 km (620–3,420 mi) (intermediate-range).”

By May 1991, “2,692 missiles” had been reported eliminated. In the ensuing 10-year period, there were regular “on-site verification inspections.” A favorite Russian proverb of the U.S. president used many times in the context of nuclear disarmament became:
“Trust, but verify” (Доверяй, но проверяй; Doveryai, no proveryai).
October 21, 2018 news reports said the USA is considering (as with the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, JCPOA, Iran Nuclear Deal) withdrawal from INF
Reaction to this World-Threatening Stunt

The October move by the United States “will pave the way to ‘complete chaos.’”

W
estern allies face a choice
…either to embark on the same path—possibly leading to new war
…or to side with common sense—at least for the sake of their self-preservation instinct” [Konstantin Kosachev, head of the Russian Federation’s Parliament’s Upper House Foreign Affairs Committee]
A
s “lunatic-too” (John Robert Bolton) heads off to a Sunday summit in Moscow,though he is rumored to be the mastermind of this latest madness.

The former Soviet leader who signed the INF with the now-deceased U.S. leader rightly asks
“Do they really not understand in Washington what this could lead to?”
Seeking to instill some sense of sanity in yet another Washington moment of crude ineptitude, insensibility and insanity, Mikhail Gorbachev urges that
“Under no circumstances should we tear up old disarmament agreements.”




Sources

News
RT “Gorbachev: Trump’s move to quit INF is ‘narrow-minded’, a clear ‘mistake’” October 21, 2018 https://www.rt.com/news/441867-gorbachev-inf-trump-withdrawal/
PressTV “Gorbachev warns Trump against ditching nuke deal: ‘Quitting INF a mistake’” October 21, 2018 https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2018/10/21/577687/US-Russia-Gorbchev-INF-nuclear-treaty-Kosachev
Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reykjav%C3%ADk_Summit
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intermediate-Range_Nuclear_Forces_Treaty
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trust,_but_verify

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Long Way from Madison—Time to Rethink, Revise

Qualifications Standards Enforcement  Prerequisites for Public Office We are a long way—carelessly and arrogantly distanced— from Madison, ...